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really that comfortable about backsliding 5 years in their retirement plans. or having to work another 7 or 8 to get back to where they were.
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It depends on where your money is/was. Resources and mfg are down. Banks are holding pretty well. There are some good bargains out there. Land is not tanking - it is correcting but there'll never be any more of it and the demand just keeps going up and up. The condo market is getting badly damaged.
THere have been losses, but they are not substantial enough to scare most of us. An unfortunate few have been wiped out - which is why you need to listen when your financial advisor tells you to diversiy !!!!
I think that the difference here is that an awful lot of the 50 somethings have lived through the same events prior to this. Things are actually not as bad (yet) as they have been in the past. It's a much more significant recession this time - there are seismic changes - the global financial system will emerge with an altered structure, but we're really moving to a lower risk - more easily sustained model.
Sooo..while there are certainly many thousands of people who have been dealt a significant financial blow - the number is not as great as the media would like us to believe. Coupled with this is the knowledge that if we stop spending our money we will get into SERIOUS trouble on a micro scale. Hindsight is providing us with a bit of reassurance, and I think that the general populace is dealing with the straitened circumstances considerably better than the press would like us to believe.